Reading Notes: Epified: Krishna, Part A

For this week's reading, I chose to watch the Krishna story through YouTube videos. I chose to do this because I felt like this option would give me a good overview and understanding of the Krishna story to begin with. 

• • Part A
  • A Summary of the First Half of the Krishna Story
  • To begin, Krishna had enemies before he was ever born, and throughout his childhood as well, but he eventually became a king.
  • Krishna's story started with the birth of the Pandava brothers.
  • Kamsa the King of Mathura found out his cousin, Devaki, and her husband, Vasudev's eighth child would be responsible for his death, so he attempted to kill Devaki and Vasudev, however, Kamsa's sister pleaded with him and the couple ended up in jail.
  • Kamsa killed the first six children birthed by Devaki. The seventh child was "transferred" to another woman's uterus. Devaki's eighth child was born a god and was never to be harmed.
  • Vasudev took his eighth son and walked free of the unlocked jail cell. He took off in the rain to save his son.
  • Vasudev ran into a problem when he could not cross a river, but a serpent came along and helped Vasudev and his son, Krishna, cross the river. 
  • When Vasudev reached his final destination, he exchanged his son for a baby girl Maya and went back to his jail cell.
  • Kamsa had received news that the baby was born, so he went to bash the baby girl's head into the wall to kill her, but he was stopped by a bright, blinding light that appeared, which he had apparently dreamed about before. 
  • Maya turned into Durga. Durga informed Kamsa that his slayer was born and in a safe place. 
  • Yashodo, the women Krishna was left with, was brought many more sons besides Krishna to take care of.
  • A visitor, Putana, became a part of Yashodo's family, but one-night Putana turned into a demoness and stole Krishna.
  • Putana was set to kill Krishna via poisonous breast milk, but Krishna ended up killing Putana.
  • Krishna's life was once again threatened by an out of control cart going down a hill, but Krishna kicked the cart out of the way.
  • Krishna eventually turned into a bad child and became known as the boy who stole butter. 
  • Krishna was eating mud, and his mother demanded him to open his mouth. When Krishna opened his mouth, his mother did not discover mud rather she discovered the universe within her son.
  • Yashodo found she was the mother of the Brahmand.
  • Yashodo's family moved from Gokul to Vrindavan.
  • A snake that lived in the river was producing tons of poison, which killed some of Krishna's loved ones. Krishna ended up killing the snake.
  • A few other demons went after Krishna, but Krishna always won. Kamsa was not giving up his mission of killing Krishna.
  • Indra started a torrential downpour on the city of Vrindavan, but Krishna saved the people by picking up a hill and creating an umbrella.
  • Krishna as a younger boy and young adult played the flute. Often times girls would dance around him as he played. From a young age Krishna only had his eyes on one dancer, Radha. 

(A statue of Krishna playing the flute. Photo by Peanut99)

• Krishna and Radha were endlessly devoted to each other from a young age.
• That was were Part A left off.
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Bibliography: Epified: Krishna. Web Source